Breakfast Topic: Buying and selling

by Elizabeth Harper Sep 21st 2007 at 8:00AM

Recently, the rogue Zeuzo, who had defeated the Black Temple and held the Twin Blades of Azzinoth reportedly sold his character for nearly $10,000. Now, that's a heck of a lot of cash, but there's also a lot of time and effort invested in a character that powerful. So for today's Breakfast topic I'm asking this: if you found yourself in possession of the best gear in the game, would you sell your character? Or would the time you put into the process be worth more than any money you could get for it?

Tags: account-selling, world-of-warcraft, wow

Filed under: Breakfast Topics

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)

Nulmorr Sep 21st 2007 8:05AM

If i had the absolute best gear in the game, I would be sad that I put that much time into it, and sell my account.

Ghen Sep 21st 2007 8:10AM

10k? hell yes.

5k? sure!

1k? well, I'd have to think about it.

bonse Sep 21st 2007 8:12AM

A problem I know I will never face is not a problem.

If it magically did happen...I would probably keep it and do what i do now, only faster. Then when wrath comes trade it in for quest greens one by one

Phehon Sep 21st 2007 8:14AM

Sell, rinse & repeat

If you're in that positoin, there's nothing more to achieve in the game imo. So I say sell and enjoy a well earnt holiday ^^

On the other hand tho, with the crappy Dollar nowadays, what could one actually buy for $ 10.000? LOL! Glad I'm living in Europe :P

Ciao

vittas Sep 21st 2007 8:25AM

for 10k$??? every1 would ... even for a lot less than that. and then ... reroll FTW ;)

Mir Sep 21st 2007 8:17AM

If you can't play Blizzard's game by Blizzard's rules, you should just go play something else. Unlike Second Life or Entropia, WoW is a game that tries to shut out the real world currency, and it should stay that way, or it will become a rich man's game.

Krishan Sep 21st 2007 8:18AM

Oh my god...that guy deserves a big slap!
WoW isn't something that will last forever, and the iminent expansion will make all that gear kind of useless :s Also, everyone will know that guy 'eBayed'.
But anyhow, 1 grand and my account will be bye-bye, seriously, it doensn't take long to relevel.
And that rogue, well if he remains friendly with his guild, spend say a month levelling a new character, and then get the guild to gear him up for more $$$ :)

Krishan Sep 21st 2007 8:18AM

Delta Sep 21st 2007 8:22AM

Meh, the idea of making money like that is certainly plausable, and one could argue that the person buying the account may be dumber the the person selling the account. Me? I don't think I would sell it off like such, but when you consider the time and monthly fees to get that high, 10k is certainly paying you back everything you spent and more to get there. Though maybe not rent, bills, food, and girlfriends.

Buuty Sep 21st 2007 8:22AM

No, Europe is MUCH better with its rampant unemployment and crippling taxes.

$10,000 will go a long way for a basement dwelling pimply faced kid.

Nynx Sep 21st 2007 8:24AM

Back in the Days of Ultima Online I was fortunate to place a Castle when the Europa Server opened up the new lands. At the time this was the equivalent of owning the twin blades.

2 weeks later I'd sold it on ebay for $950US to someone who then turned it into a hub for his thriving roleplaying guild.

About 3 or 4 months after that I sold my UO account with a Tower and 3 other houses on it for another $450.

The total time invested at the time was about 3 years of playtime and the money I got from selling the accounts didn't even touch the cost I incurred in telephone bills in the days before ADSL. I needed the money.

Back then though there wasn't any restrictions on that sort of thing placed by Origin, the Publishers

If there wasn't the tough restrictions in place disallowing this sort of thing in WoW I wouldn't hesitate to do the same with my account once I'd decided to quit for good.

Urofseron Sep 21st 2007 8:33AM

WTS: My account $200

Hoofio Sep 21st 2007 8:31AM

rampant unemployment? ... reckon you have a considerably higher percentage.. you just dont count em all

crippling taxes? ... more like US has stupidly low taxes - the richer you are the better you do, eh?...
oh, and 2 words: health_care

hey, this is much more fun than talking about some stupid MMO :D

Demeth Sep 21st 2007 8:31AM

If I quit with the intent of not coming back, of course I would sell my account.

Another thing: If this sale is compared to a real life job at minimum wage (around $7/hr depending on where you live), you would have to work for 1,429 hours (or 59.5 days straight) to gain $10,000.

Kaylek Sep 21st 2007 8:33AM

I think it's a rich situation, seeing all the flak "casual players" give hardcore raiders for "wasting so much time on a game," and now the guy's gotten a nice return on his work.

In the same situation, I would sell too. Take the money and level another class (if I choose to keep playing).

AeroZeppelin Sep 21st 2007 8:41AM

I really detest the selling/buying of gold, but for some reason I have no problem with the selling/buying of characters. It seems to be more of an investment and its not taking away from the experience of the game. However, $10000 is a crazy price to ask for a cartoon character.

overneathe Sep 21st 2007 8:36AM

Unemployment and taxes? LAWL hahaha. You americans always find a good way for us to laugh at you.
Most normal EU families have time to travel through the whole EU with no financial or otherwise problem.
The dollars are dying and u guys can only stay back n watch them die. We're in ur stocks devaluating ur cashez!

Rekman Sep 21st 2007 8:50AM

If I could get that amount of money I would ASAP.

I don't mind people to sell their account, they have spent many hours to achieve what they got.

The bad thing is the one that power level just for a quick sell, they ruin this option.

Brandisis Sep 21st 2007 8:38AM

For 10K I'd sell it in a heartbeat. It's a game and the best part of it is actually playing it. Once you get the best gear what else is there to do?

Plus like someone else already said, this game will not last forever, and something else bigger and better will come along. I'd be kicking myself for holding on to that account and not selling it when I had the chance to make a bundle off of it.

Jeremy Sep 21st 2007 9:20AM

OK, let's break it down.

Since, as the goblins are quick to tell you, "Time is money, friend," how much time is $10,000 really worth? Well, if you work a $20/hr job, that's 12 weeks income - not a bad windfall, I guess, but that account didn't become so stacked without a little investment itself.

The question then is: how much time DID this guy spend on this account? I don't think anybody other than he and the guy who bought the account could really say, but we can make some estimates.

Since he has the best gear in the game, one can assume he spends nearly the most time playing the game. As a (rough) comparison, in the early days of EQ (when I was effectively "living in my parents' basement") I clocked in around 2400 hours per year, or 200 hours per month (and trust me, some people played more than I did).

Looking back to TBC release *alone*, there are 8 months of gameplay. If he followed my basement-dwelling numbers, that would have placed him at 1600 hours /played in TBC alone! So, in such a case, selling for $10,000 would net you a paltry $6/hr wage - well below your normal earning potential (and, indeed, barely above minimum wage).

Maybe he didn't play that much. Maybe he played more. But, at the end, I don't think that number could be off by *too* much - even if he only played half as much as I did in EQ, he's still only earning $12/hr at the game - and that's nothing to write home about.

The point of all of this is that, if you want to make money, selling an account (even a truly pimped out account) in WoW is not a great way to go about it. You can certainly look at it as a way to recoup some of your lost time when you quit, but by and large you could be getting a MUCH better return on your time investment - even if you're just working a second job at Walmart.

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